Well, against all the odds Crufts was brilliant!

We left home shortly after 3am to arrive at the crack of dawn, as usual – if you want to get in the disabled car park you have to! We arrived, set up camp and I got Solei out so I could give him a quick walk round and see how he was. He pulled away a little bit and spooked over the noisy bits of floor but he was actually walking pretty well 🙂 So that was a relief. After that I pretty much made myself scarce – it was about 7:30am, judging started at 8:30am and there were 7 classes before Solei was in with quite a few dogs in them so I knew we had a while and I wanted to be out of his sight for a nice long time.

Crufts is *enormous*, there’s no way you can appreciate it properly in one day – especially if you’re showing. Never the less I wandered round the trade stands and spent a nice long time visiting my “other breed” at Discover Dogs – and folding leaflets for them! I’d had the inspired idea of taking walkie talkies so I could keep in touch with how the judging was progressing and not miss my class but not arrive back too soon either and ruin the previous hours I’d spent out of Solei’s sight!

I’d asked T if she’d groom him up for me because he’s been playing up a bit when I groom him recently (not happy) and I don’t think that’s helping with the way he shows for me either. So I lurked out of his sight until they called his class and then took his lead and (without a word) took him into the ring!

The thing I didn’t like to mention before because of tempting fate 😆 was that a few weeks ago our Crufts judge pulled out because of ill health, and our replacement was a complete surprise (usually they pull them forward, so the 2010 judge would do 2009..etc) – she has given Solei’s aunt a CC in the past and judged Solei a year ago at an open show and gave him Reserve Best of Breed (incidently the dog that beat him for BOB that day he beat today), so I knew she liked him and we were in with a chance.

There were 18 dogs entered in his class and they were actually all there too, so we were waiting in the ring for a long time and Solei had his photograph taken by 3 different people 😀 and they’re only the ones I saw….apparently there was at least 1 other man too. And people (even foreign people from FCI countries where Phalenes are much stronger!) were commenting on him and saying how nice he was 🙂

As I’m sure you all know by now I went not even sure if he was going to walk on a lead never mind show with his tail up! But in the end he was pretty good….he stood ok at the beginning, showed pretty well (though we had a dodgy bit when the floor moved – anyone who’s been to Crufts will know what I mean, there are strips where there are powerpoints or something under the floor and so the whole section unlocks and lifts up, and the rings are all covered in green carpet so you can’t see where they are either – and he shied away from me) and then when they were all stood at the end he was the best he’s ever been…..but she was cutting 5 out and then placing later after standing and moving them again and he wasn’t as good on the stand then but his tail didn’t drop totally and he obviously held it together enough as he got a 3rd!! 🙂

The major news is that now gives him his stud book number! It’s a great accolade and also gives him lifetime Crufts qualification! That’s always been my goal for him ever since I’ve been showing him and with his tooth imminently coming out (I didn’t think it would see Crufts, but it has) I really didn’t think he’d be able to do it. I can’t even begin to tell you how I feel about that 😀

Really can’t even begin to describe how I’m feeling now…I wanted that Stud Book Number *so* much. And it was a nice class too – he beat CC winners, RCC winners and both the dogs ahead of him have done a lot of winning 🙂 Well, the 2nd has…the 1st I haven’t seen shown much recently (last couple of years) but I know has a Pap Club BIS and a RCC to his credit. I looked in the catalogue this afternoon and although I knew it was a nice class with CC and RCC winners I hadn’t realised just how many CC and RCC winners there actually were. Can be very, very happy looking at what he beat!

I’d been told we’d been moved up a stud book band but had no proof (which made all the difference – if we had been moved up 3rd in the class Solei was in was enough, if we hadn’t it wasn’t) and so after he placed I ran over to the Kennel Club stand to ask and I was given a piece of paper with the breeds on, I grabbed it, scanned it and when I found we had been moved up I punched the air and said “YES!” totally involuntary reaction. Poor guy thought I was nuts 😆

Being a glutten for punishment on Sunday I managed (still not quite sure how!) to drag myself off to an agilty show to give the boys some experience as Solei will be doing agility and Alfie will probably be going to an agility home. I was a bit concerned about the seesaw but as it happened there wasn’t actually one! So that was brilliant from my point of view as they got the atmosphere without any bangs to potentially scare them. Solei was more interested in sniffing the floor and trying to stick his nose up every dog’s bum 😆 but he wasn’t at all fazed by it and Alfie was in his element saying hello to everyone and everything (everyone was enchanted by him) and he was really interested in watching what was going on too.

I was absolutely FLOATING but now the euphoria is starting to wear off and I’m just so tired. Bit disappointed because I wanted that lovely floaty excitement to last for longer! It doesn’t help that it’s really hit hard because of the lousy timing – Fancy’s puppies would be exactly 6 months right about now and they should be doing their first show this weekend, Mystery would be 6 months next week and the puppies that were due in the other breed would be due either this weekor next.

Talking of which, Fancy came into season on Friday; we got the news at Crufts! So we’ve got to make arrangements but if all goes to plan she’ll be mated to Solei again and we shall hope it’s more successful than the last time.